Couples Therapy
by JMHB
Summary: Bella is a therapist that specialises in couples therapy. Her place of practise: an inn in Washington. Edward is just in the right place at the right time when fate steps in. What happens next? Read and review! : btw- to know about me, read the A/Ns!


**Chapter 1**

**Summary: **Bella is a therapist that specialises in couples therapy. Her place of practise: an inn in Washington. Edward is just in the right place at the right time when fate steps in. What happens next? Read and review!! (: btw- to know about me, read the author's notes!

**Author's Note: **Hi everyone! My name is Janice, but I prefer Jane like Jane Austen! My friend told me about fanfiction, and I thought I would give it a go. This is the second chapter I've ever posted on fanfiction, so go easy? I guess I should tell you a bit about myself first... perhaps why I'm writing fanfiction? I'm a fresh high-school graduate, new on the streets of Wisconsin (the state of cheese and beer), and I've gotten myself into a terrible fix. My dad and I share a car... and he works all day. Which means either I wake up at five-thirty (who goes into work at five-freaking-thirty?!) to get the car so I can go to the library and sit around and read, or I sleep in, stay at home, and sit around and read. I'm going to try my absolute hardest to stick to a schedule (I'm thinking updating every Monday.) Now, please read, enjoy, and review!!

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It was early morning when the first couple arrived. They were young, passionate, and extremely agitated. The woman had cold blue eyes and pale blonde hair, and the body of a model. The man had thick, short curly hair and dark blue eyes. He was at least six and a half feet tall, and Bella felt small and pathetic in comparison. They stormed through the entryway without stopping, the woman at least four or five strides in front of the man, who was weighed down by six bags.

"Emmett McCarty, hurry up!" the woman said exasperatedly, flipping her hair and continuing to walk through the lobby to the stairs.

"Coming, Rosie." The man named Emmett said after her. He glanced around the lobby and stopped in front of the front desk, dropping the six bags in his hands. The ground quaked from the disturbance.

"Hi." He said to Bella, shaking his hair out of his eyes. "I'm Emmett McCarty. I have reservations for a room for two?" he said questioningly. Bella nodded.

"Yes, Mr. McCarty." She stood behind the computer and pulled up the information. "Room eight. That's upstairs and to your left." She pulled the key off the rack behind her and handed it to Emmett.

"Thanks." He said smiling, a dimple gracing his cheek. Bella smiled back, this Emmett's smile was infectious. He bent down and took hold of the bags and heaved them up the stairs behind the statuette blonde.

Bella sighed. She wondered why the couple was here for the weekend of couples therapy. The man seemed nice enough, and she didn't have much to say about the girl. She couldn't help but think that the woman would have decided they needed therapy, and Emmett had gone along with it.

Before she could seriously consider the reasons for "Couple #1" as she thought of them in her head, a small, pixie-like woman burst through the door. Trailing behind her was a tall, blonde man who was toting three bags. They were matching luggage, and Bella raised her eyebrow. The woman had jet-black hair and it was spiked in a fashionable manner. In her head, Bella quickly named the couple "Couple #2" in her mind.

"Hello Bella!" the small woman said in a beautiful soprano voice. Bella started.

"Er... how do you know my name?" Bella asked the woman.

"Don't question my amazing powers!" the woman said in a sing-song voice.

"Okay." Bella said easily. When the man had entered the lobby behind the small pixie, Bella felt at ease and like it was normal for a stranger to know her name. "May I ask your name?" she said politely.

"Alice Whitlock. That's my husband Jasper." Alice leaned in toward Bella and whispered behind her hand to Bella, "He's jealous of me." Then she laughed, and her laugh was as melodious as her voice. Bella grinned, Couple 2 was certainly going to be entertaining.

"Well, Mr. and Mrs. Whitlock, you are in room twelve. That's upstairs and directly to the right." Alice beamed and took the key.

"Told you." She said to Jasper as she climbed the stairs. Jasper sighed quietly and looked at Bella.

"She guessed the room number in the car." He said quietly. Then he grinned and followed his wife up the stairs.

Bella looked at the clock in the window. The first session of couples therapy was due to start in twenty minutes. There were three couples that were attending the sessions. This left one couple still unaccounted for. Bella busied herself in the lobby, wanting to see the third couple and keep them from waiting when they walked through the door.

As Bella was dusting, she watched a black Mercedes pull up and park in the closest parking slot. A tall, blonde man stood. He quickly walked around the car to pull open the passenger door. He looked to be about thirty-five. A young woman with caramel hair and skin got out of the passenger's side before the man got to the door.

He looked clearly annoyed, but he pulled the woman into the crook of his arm and walked into the lobby. Bella smiled at the couple, who looked to be the oldest couple here for therapy. This alone slightly surprised Bella. She always imagined middle-aged couples in therapy, but both of the other couples seemed quite young. The man smiled at Bella and walked hisself and his wife to the front desk.

"Hello. My name is Carlisle Cullen and this is my wife Esme Cullen. We're here for the weekend couples therapy." Carlisle said with precision. Esme's jaw seemed to tighten for a second, but it relaxed quickly enough that Bella thought she might have imagined it.

"Hi. My name is Bella. I'm the therapist this weekend." Bella said as she looked up the Cullen's information. "You are in room two. It's up the stairs and to the left. Two doors down." She smiled at Carlisle and Esme.

"Thank you dear." Esme said quietly. Carlisle looked at Esme and smiled.

"Yes, Bella." He said, "thank you." They walked up the stairs together. Bella was slightly confused. This couple seemed to be both completely in love and a very happy couple. Or at least content, Bella thought.

--

The first session took place in the sitting room. It was four o'clock when the first couple appeared. It was Couple #2. Alice Whitlock skipped in, literally, and sat down on the small sofa to the far right of the room, by the large window. Jasper Whitlock sat next to her, stiff backed and with a look of annoyance on his features.

The next couple to arrive in the sitting room was the Cullen's. Carlisle led Esme into the room and sat in the plush chair on the left, by the large potted plant. Carlisle pulled Esme onto his lap. Esme looked uncomfortable and was shifting every couple of minutes as they waited for the third and final couple to arrive.

After four fifteen, there was a clang on the stairs. Bella ran out to investigate and found Emmett McCarty with his wife's legs wrapped around his waist as they were in a very intense lip lock. Bella blushed and coughed to get their attention.

"Oh, sorry." Emmett's wife said, unwrapping her legs from Emmett's waist. Bella returned to the sitting room, a blush still furious on her face. She didn't say anything but returned to her chair and picked up her notebook. _Couple #1_ she scribbled furiously _easily physically expresses emotions._

Alice Whitlock giggled when Emmett McCarty and his wife entered the room. Bella watched in slight confusion as the woman took the chair in the center of the room, and Emmett sat on the ground by her feet. _What is up with that?_ Bella thought, but she pushed it out of her mind and started the session.

--

"Hello everyone. To start I thought we could all go around the circle and tell a bit about ourselves. This includes our name, occupation, and reason for being here." She made eye contact with everyone in the room and smiled. "I'll start, shall I?" she asked. Alice Whitlock nodded, and Esme Cullen smiled in a reassuring sort of way.

"My name is Isabella Swan, but you can all call me Bella. I am a couple's therapist and my father owned the bed and breakfast. When he died, I took over the B&B and now I run it mainly for couples therapy weekends. Sometimes I have the occasional 'regular' client who is looking for a small vacation from the city." She paused after the little speech, waiting for someone to volunteer to go next. Luckily, Alice Whitlock grinned and started talking.

"I'm Alice Whitlock, and I am a clothing and costume designer for movies and actors. Currently, I'm working on the attire for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows." She grinned widely. "My husband and I are here because I see the future, and he is jealous of me. It causes a lot of fights and has gotten in the way of our sex life."

She smiled around the group as if it was the most normal thing in the world to discuss her and her husband's fading sex-life. "Jasper, you're next." She said, poking Jasper in the side. He nodded and rubbed his hands along the length of his thighs.

"My name is Jasper Whitlock, and I am a Civil War Historian. I'm a professor at Colorado University in the Historical department. I teach Civil War Studies. My wife and I have regular arguments over seemingly nothing and it is straining our relationship." He said quietly. Alice giggled and threw her arms around his neck, kissing his cheek.

"Atta, boy!" she giggled. Jasper looked slightly annoyed by the public display of affection. Bella wrote down the differences in personality between Couple #1 and Couple #2. After a moment, Bella nodded toward Couple #1, the McCarty's. Rosalie McCarty sighed and swished her platinum hair.

"I am Rosalie Hale-McCarty, the model. I've been on the cover of Sports Illustrated twice, and I am a regular on the Soap Opera, _Passions_." Emmett seemed to glow when Rosalie spoke of her accomplishments. "My husband and I are here because he thinks we don't communicate enough." Rosalie seemed bored when she spoke, playing first with a lock of hair and then her long nails.

Bella felt significantly undeserving to be in Rosalie's presence. It didn't matter that Rosalie was just another woman... no, she had to bring Sports Illustrated into this. Great, Bella thought as an aside. Shaking her head slowly to discourage herself of such thoughts, she turned to Emmett McCarty, to see a man who was throwing furtive glances at his wife.

"Mr. McCarty?" Bella prompted, trying to get his attention. Rosalie nodded.

"Hi everyone. I'm Emmett McCarty." Emmett said in a boisterious voice. "I'm a high school gym coach, and I also coach wrestling after school. My wife is the best woman around, but we don't talk like we used to. I miss being able to actually talk to her." Emmett said. Bella tried not to smile. Emmett was probably going to be her favourite, simply because he was so generally likeable. However, showing favouritism before the orientation was even done... probably not the best idea. Instead, Bella turned to Mr. and Mrs. Cullen.

"Hello, my name is Carlisle Cullen. I am a doctor at Forks Hospital in Washington." Carlisle said in an authorative voice. "This is my wife, Esme Cullen. She is an interior designer." he gestured to the woman sitting uncomfortably on his lap. "Esme and I are here because she wanted to come." he said.

Bella didn't really know what to do with that. For the most part, whenever a situation got uncomfortable, Bella liked to push ahead conversation, and in orientations, all conversation was uncomfortable, so Bella liked to have talking constantly. But Esme had already been introduced, even if it wasn't by herself, but rather her husband... Bella didn't really want to admit it, but she was stunned.

"Carlisle, please." Esme whispered so quietly that Bella didn't know if she actually heard it correctly. Carlisle dismissed Esme's quiet pleas.

Not sure of what to do, Bella sat there, staring blankly around the room. After a moment, Bella shook her head and her mind started turning again. Couples therapy session. Running it. Okay.

"Alright, now that we've all been introduced to each other, let's begin." Bella said in a calm and kind voice. She wanted to make sure that everyone in the room felt comfortable. Comfortable people opened up more easily than people who felt uncomfortable. Of course, this was common knowledge.

"We'll start." Alice Whitlock said. Bella blanched.

"Uhm, okay." Bella said. She was a little thrown off by Alice's will to set examples, but she was very glad that it meant less prying later.

"Right. So, I can see the future." Alice said quite plainly. "My visions are almost always accurate, but they only stay that way if the people they concern stay on the same path. I saw Jasper before we met, and I knew that we were meant to be together. Of course, my visions are not always perfect, and it is difficult sometimes for Jasper to accept. For example, last year we were trying to get pregnant.

"Instead of getting pregnant after three months of trying, like my original vision had shown, I got sick and could not get pregnant during that third month. At that point, I stopped having visions about having a baby, and that made Jasper feel a little frustrated, obviously, because I was supposed to get pregnant. That was when the arguments started, and now we are constantly fighting about me not getting pregnant like my visions indicated."

Oh. This was a little more in-depth than Bella was ready for on the first session. These deep conversations and revelations weren't supossed to happen until after the second of third session, at least. Not today.

"Oh yeah, you might want to go outside for a minute or two, Bella." Alice smiled widely at Bella, and scooted her out of the room and into the lobby.

There was a young man, probably about mid-twenties, standing in the room. It had started to rain outside, and the man's hair was dripping wet, his clothes plastered to his body, a physical consent to the pouring rain.

"Hello." the man said. He shook his head out of his eyes, which were dark green. His eyes were just as stormy as the outside sky, and his tone was clipped. "I need a room for the night. My car broke down a ways down the road, and I can't get anyone to fix it until Monday." Bella stared at him. This guy was absolutely gorgeous. He was tall and lean, and the wet clothes stuck to each of his muscles, defining them quite attratively.

"Sure thing." Bella said after a moment of staring blatently at the beauty of this man. Her voice was quietly breathless. She took his information and put it into the computer, willing herself to not "google" Edward Masen, which was the name of the man standing in front of her.

Edward Masen was twenty-seven years old, according to his Driver's Licence, and he lived in Illoinois.

"So... what brings you to Washington?" Bella asked brokenly, attempting to complete a sentence around this beautiful stranger.

"Business." Edward Masen said. His mouth moved quite beautifully when he spoke. Bella couldn't help but take a real look at this guy. He was at least six feet tall. He had thick hair, and it stood up in many places, making Bella think that he had run his hand through his hair a lot since stepping out of the rain. He had deep green eyes that were immistakably clear and naturally penetrating, and thin, horn-rimmed glasses that sat on his long nose.

"Room four." Bella said, pulling the key off the hook and handing it to Edward. The moment his hand touched hers, she felt a zing of electricity shoot up her arm and straight to her stomach. She stared, open mouthed at their hands, joined by the small key that she wouldn't let go of save the shock, the one that he wouldn't let go of because it was his room key for the next three days.

"Thank you." Edward Masen said. His voice was rather chilled. Bella looked at him, confused, for a moment and then dropped her grasp on the key as if it had personally stung her. Edward Masen grabbed his small duffel bag that was resting at his feet and looked around the lobby. "Erm, where is room four?" he asked.

"Upstairs and to the left." Bella clipped, walking briskly back to the sitting room. She thought she heard a quiet chuckle from the lobby as she left, but decided it was just the wind of the storm, and pushed it out of her mind completely.

"Now..." Bella said, settling back on her chair with her clipboard and pen. "Where were we?" she looked about the room.

"I was talking about my curious lack of pregnancy." Alice pronounced, bouncing up and down in her seat. "You see, my visions are subjective. They are based on the thoughts and intended actions of the people around me. I never stopped wanting to have a baby. I would always try my hardest to have a baby. And yet, I'm not pregnant, nor was I ever." Alice's voice had taken on a sharp undertone, and her eyes hardened. Then she sighed, and the tension left her body and her voice. "Oh well."

The room fell silent.

"Okay, well that's enough from me." Alice said suddenly, bouncing again. "I think it should be your turn, Rosalie and Emmett." Rosalie Hale-McCarty flipped her hair and stuck her nose in the air. She brought her left hand to her face and started examining her nails.

"Uhm..." Emmett mumbled for a moment, then he started talking with an animation that rivaled Alice. "Rosie was a great girl when I met her in college. She was hot, loved to party, and had this amazing body..." he trailed off, starry-eyed. Rosalie smacked the top of his head and then resumed to examining her nails. "Ow! But she was the greatest girl around. So beautiful, with this cornsilk hair, and she was really smart, too. Not like the other blondes at school. She wanted to be an actress.

"I fell in love with her the moment I met her, and then I spent the next two years convincing her that I was the one that could make her happy. But I wanted to be a gym coach, you know? And she was going to be on the silver screen. I'm so lucky that she even looked twice at me." Emmett's face puckered into a classic pout. "I really don't deserve her, I never have. But now that I might lose her to the business... I just wanted to make sure she knew that I would do anything to keep us together. I love her so much."

Rosalie froze, and her icy facade melted as she looked at her husband. She smiled sweetly and patted the top of his head. He preened under her attention.

"Okay, then." Bella said, slightly surprised by Emmett's confession. "How about you go next, Dr. and Mrs. Cullen."

"I love my wife." Carlisle Cullen said. "We're here because she wished to know if we could improve our relationship. Though I'm not positive what needs improving..." he trailed off, his authoritative voice carrying across the room.

"Well, I'm sure you can improve some aspect of your relationship, whether it be communication, or consensual, or otherwise. That's one of the great things about couples therapy. You can take from it what you wish and make your marriage so much better." Bella said. Carlisle shot her a cold look. "Not that your marriage is lacking now, it's just that there's always room for improvement."

"I suppose so." Carlisle said. Esme Cullen watched Carlisle for a moment, then turned to Bella.

"He's overprotective." she said suddenly. "I can't get anything done around the house because he wants to keep me safe. Last week I had to turn down a client because Carlisle thought he might be a drug dealer. I love him, but I'd like to be able to move around my own house without worrying about what might happen if a knife might possibly slip from the open cabinet down onto my head."

"Esme, not in public." Carlisle said sternly.

"We're not in public, dear. We're at couples therapy." Esme shot back, her voice saturated with sweetness, but her eyes were hard with annoyance as she looked at Carlisle. He returned the annoyance.

"Well," Bella said quickly. "I think we're done for now, it's been an hour, and I think we should start up here tomorrow. For the time being, I'm going to work on setting up some couple activities to improve communication. That will be tomorrow's goal, positive communication. If anyone needs to talk to me privately, please feel free to come talk to me. The evening is yours."

Bella watched as Rosalie and Emmett looked at each other, puppy-eyed, like a couple of lovebirds, as they took hands and walked slowly out of the room. She could hear Rosalie's giggle from the stairway. Esme and Carlisle walked stiffly out of the room, talking lowly about where they should like to eat dinner. Esme said she had seen a good restaurant in town that she would like to try, and Carlisle, after a sharp pause, agreed. Alice sent Jasper up to the room, claiming that she wished to speak to Bella alone.

"So, what do you think of Mr. Sexy-Pants?" Alice asked Bella, bouning up and down as she appraised Bella's expression of utter confusion.

"Mr. Sexy-who?" Bella asked.

"Edward Masen!" Alice nearly shouted. "He's so hot. You two are going to make a great couple!" she giggled.

"What are you-- I think you're obviously-- I do not know what you are talking about." Bella stuttered.

"Ha! I'm talking about the fact that Edward Masen is the hottest man you've ever set eyes on! I'm talking about the fact that 'He's so fine, he blows your mind'! I'm talking about the fact that I saw you and him, together, and I mean, _together_, being all lovey-dovey and gooey-eyed on a date where there were candles and soft music and great food and a look in his eye like he wanted to ravish you!" Alice laughed.

"Wha--When did you see this?" Bella asked.

"In a vision." Alice said smugly.

"Well... didn't you say your visions are subjective? Besides, I don't think that will happen. He didn't seem to be so buddy-buddy earlier." Bella said. "Anyway, when did you see this? A month ago?"

"About five minutes ago, actually." Alice grinned. Bella looked at Alice, her eyes full of horror. "Oh now, don't be frightened. He's hot." Alice giggled and skipped out of the room.

Well, Bella thought wryly as she hunkered down to work on the communication building activities, it isn't like sanity is commonplace in therapy.

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**A/N:** Alright guys. What do you think?? Good, bad, ugly... disturbing? Only slightly? I dunno what you think, so let me know in a review!!

Also, check out my beta's stuff ***BROKENTOPAZ*** She's on extended leave from fanfiction (personal stuff) but I'm sure she would just love a review or two!

Right, so... Review. Do it!! :)

Thanks for reading my dribbling fanfiction. I hoped it wasn't too awful.

Love,

JMHB


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